All things animal in Southern California and beyond

Qing Song, a 54-year-old Sonoma County resident, pleaded guilty to a felony charge of importing guitar picks made from the shells of the endangered hawksbill sea turtle. Under the Endangered Species Act, it's illegal to sell such items in the U.S.

Tortoiseshell guitar picks, although illegal to purchase, have a somewhat mythical reputation among some guitar players, who say the tone produced by them is unrivaled by plastic picks. A luthier (the term for a person who makes or repairs stringed instruments) named John Greven even dedicated several years of work to creating a tortoiseshell fake that could replicate the tone of the coveted, illegal original. (The resulting material, which he called Tor-Tis, is now used to make picks and pickguards.)